for Yehuda Amichai
Page of sand, scab-flakes of ink;
page of sand, page of skin:
where are you now?
On the tongue, life is a verb
and death, a proverb:
Apple eats apple-blossom,
seed eats the apple.…
Your name, in the macaroni
of tongues, Ah-me-hide,
foriegn and sentimental
as the pendant Chai—life—
noosing the ancients of St. Pete
waiting for the Early Bird Special
—or the girls in Bolinas
you saw loosening
their tefillin-strap
bikinis: souls
opening and closing,
a prayer drifting everywhere
but up—
Proverbial waves lap
a beach of crumbs.
Letters swirl in fat broth,
a name is lifted to the lips;
waiters wipe
the clock face clean.
Drop the page,
come out. Come out:
the body is an apple
to the seed,
the body is a seed in the earth.
DAVID GEWANTER